Aug 19, 2021

Greetings,

This Tuesday we begin our 92nd school year at St. Sebastian Parish School! Welcome back students, faculty and staff. During the long summer the school has been painted, updated, improved and scrubbed. She will look as different to you as our students look different to her after three months of growth, larger school clothes to match and first day of school haircuts.

The school to which are students are returning, ranked last year as one of the highest in the eight counties of our diocese in both growth and achievement! We received notice just this week that St. Sebastian Parish School finished in the top three in the Akron Beacon Journal’s “Best of the Best” in the category of private schools.

Our new entrance is finished, making the school not only easier to navigate for first time visitors but also much safer. Some new exterior lighting should be finished in time for the first day of school and the grounds crew have done a magnificent job of making our campus a beautiful place for children to learn.

There will be, of course, some difficult waters to navigate as we wait to see what COVID has ready for us as we all head indoors. St. Sebastian is well prepared for any eventuality, as I think was proven last year.

Also, I wish blessings on those who attend others schools and on our students returning to college. Be safe, do well and make your patron St. Sebastian proud!

IN OTHER NEWS:

CHANGE IN THE MASS SCHEDULE:  Thursday daily Mass is moving to 8:00am this week! The reason the Thursday Mass was at 8:15 was that this is the Mass that the school attended. About ten years ago I decided to keep it at 8:15 year-round to avoid confusion when it changed back and forth. Because of COVID and crowding, the school Mass was moved to later in the morning. Since there is no longer a need to have Mass at 8:15, it will be permanently moved, year-round, to 8:00am beginning this week.

GOLFER’S MASS:  There are only a couple of weeks left for the 7:00am Sunday Summer Mass. This Mass time comes to an end Labor Day weekend.

DIOCESAN SCHOOL PLAN UPDATE:  As you might recall, I serve on the diocese’s Think Tank for the future of Catholic schools. We have been meeting and working diligently over the summer with the hope of submitting a plan in October. It is a huge undertaking trying to reinvent how we do “school” when it hasn’t really changed that much since the founding of the diocese! Please pray for the endeavor to make our schools better and more affordable!

God bless,

Fr. Valencheck